Food Network won't renew Paula Deen's contract

(USA TODAY) -- The Food Network says it won't renew Paula Deen's contract after the admission she used racial slurs.

The network said in a news release Friday afternoon that it would not renew Deen's contract when it expires at the end of the month.

Deen has built an empire from her television shows, cookbooks and product endorsements. The Food Network began airing Paula's Home Cooking in 2002 and added Paula's Best Dishes in 2008.

Deen admitted while being questioned as part of a lawsuit that she had used racial slurs in the past. The network's announcement came just hours after she posted two videos online apologizing for her past mistakes.

TMZ calls it "weird," and notes the "edit after almost every sentence."

The Food Network host and celeb chef, who canceled an appearance on the Today show this morning at the last minute, goes on to say,"I want to apologize to everybody for the wrong that I've done. I want to learn and grow from this."

Soon after the oddly-edited video appeared on YouTube, it seemed to have been pulled and a second Deen apology video appeared. This one doesn't appear to be edited at all.

She talks about how she was "physically not able" to appear on the Today show this morning and now has pulled herself together and wants to apologize. "My family and I are not the kind of people that the press is wanting to say we are. ... Your color of your skin, your religion, your sexual preference does not matter to me. It's what's in the heart ... and my family and I try to live by that. I'm here to say I'm so sorry. I was wrong. ... I offer my sincere apology to those that I have hurt and I hope that you forgive me because this comes from the deepest part of my heart."

Her reps have not commented to USA TODAY about either video.

Deen, 66, admitted in a lawsuit deposition that she has used the n-word. She is being sued along with her brother, Bubba Hiers, by Lisa Jackson, a former manager of the siblings' restaurant, Uncle Bubba's Seafood and Oyster House. The lawsuit alleges sexual harassment and a work environment rife with racial slurs.